By Daniele Iannarone
This past week, taking the time to learn about the struggles of “Generation 1.5” Korean immigrants was fascinating. This is really a demographic that can often be overlooked when learning about or teaching languages, however, the struggle they face is definitely something we should acknowledge, recognize and work toward trying to help these people establish themselves and gain a sense of identity.
Just to clarify, a study conducted by Jean Kim and Patricia A. Duff (2012) in various Canadian universities sought to discover how Generation 1.5 Korean-Canadian university students identified and used their various languages (Korean and English). Among their various conclusions, the one that struck me most was that the ones who were more fluent in English and better integrated into the overarching English-speaking community were seen by their “less-integrated” Korean peers as a sort of “act of betrayal” (Kim & Duff, 2012, p. 89). Even though there were many Koreans in the schools, they were, in a sense, defined by who they spent time with and the primary language spoken between each other, and this would, in turn, define their “Korean-ness” (Kim & Duff, 2012).
This study really allowed me to reflect on several experiences I can relate to from my life and my family.
First off, I remember when I was younger, in my late teens, I had a family from Mexico move two doors down. Thinking back, this was really the first time I’d come face-to-face with this idea of Generation 1.5. At the time, as a budding entrepreneur of 15 years old with my own neighbourhood lawn-mowing business (which clearly never panned out over the long-term), I went over to these new neighbours to introduce myself and offer my services. It also helped that I was learning Spanish at the time, and I was able to converse with the parents. I met the children, of which there were four, and the two eldest were around my age, whereas the two youngest were in elementary school. The elder daughters were older when they came to Canada, and, as such, spoke fluently in Spanish and were limited in their English abilities. The opposite was true for the younger siblings, as they had started elementary school in English, and even spoke to each other in English instead of Spanish. It was apparently a struggle to get them to speak in Spanish at home at all. The older sisters were critical of this, concerned that their unwillingness to use Spanish regularly might lead them to become more assimilated and less connected to their cultures.
Similarly, I think I can partially relate the Generation 1.5 experience to my own family, as there were also times when we feared for our identities and culture. My parents and their siblings all came to Canada from Italy when they were around six years old. At the time, they only knew how to speak Italian, however, as, one by one, they all started going to English school (as French schools were rejecting Italian immigrants at the time), English became the language they used most outside the home, and eventually became the language used to speak to each other, to the dismay of my grandparents. My grandmother often tells me how she grew frustrated that they would speak to each other in English around the dinner table as she had trouble understanding them. With this said, she has also told me that she was happy they were picking up English so efficiently and that this would lead to more positive opportunities later on in life, which it did. This was the situation for both my parents.
When my sister and I were born, my parents decided to raise us speaking Italian at home. As such, we would hear them speak in English, but we would only really speak Italian until we started elementary school. Once this happened, and we became more proficient in English, somehow – and I don’t know exactly when, how, or why – we started to speak in English to our parents, and this is still the case today.
Of course, to note is that the way that my parents taught me Italian definitely differed to how they were taught Italian from their parents. There was even a study about this by Gloria Notarangelo (2016) that discovered that “the percentage of Italian language used in the relation first-second generation and that spoken between second and third generation, has decreased from 90% to 20%” (p. 12).
Finally, to link this all together, I’d like to relate back to the idea of Generation 1.5 and the struggles faced by some of these Korean-Canadian university students. If you recall, one of the discoveries for me while reading the study was to see that the “less integrated” Koreans would discriminate against the “more-integrated/English speaking” Koreans for, in a sense, “betraying their culture” (Kim & Duff, 2012). As a proud Italian-Canadian, I am extremely happy to be able to speak my language and connect with my rich culture. We were brought up with the strong sense that knowledge of Italian linked us to our identities and our culture, and therefore when I meet Italian-Canadians who have little to no knowledge of the Italian language, I cannot stop myself from low-key judging them for, in a sense, forgoing their own cultures and identities. Sure, my parents’ and my generation did not live the Generation 1.5, but I believe that, at the end of the day, in the case of all of the aforementioned cases and examples, it’s always a question of fear of loss of culture or identity.
As we see in this video by Italian-Montreal comedian Guido Grasso, however, even our old Italian ‘nonna’ mixes in English when speaking to relatives in Italy.
References:
Kim, J., & Duff, P. A. (2012). The language socialization and identity negotiations of generation 1.5 Korean- Canadian university students. TESL Canada Journal, 29(6), 81–102. Retrieved from http://www.teslcanadajournal.ca/index.php/tesl/article/view/1111/930
Notarangelo, G., Iacoviello, A. (2016). Frenitalianese in Montreal: when French, Italian and English collide. Retrieved from: https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/42901882.pdf
[debstube100]. (2013, January 18). Guido Grasso – Italian vs. North American Italian [Video]. Youtube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_NItXn1ipoQ&ab_channel=debstube100
